Dave Rennie Is About To Learn An Auld Scots Saying: I wants Don't Get.

ON OPENING my diary this morning, I noted I should have been going to Millbrae this afternoon, to cover the Ayrshire Bulls v Aberavon match, which would have been Bulls final fixture in the inaugural cross-border games between the FOSROC Super6 teams and the top six clubs nominated from the Welsh Premiership. By around five pm tonight, if not before, we should have known which teams would be playing in the knock-out stages of this new competition.

The question now is – will this competition ever take place? I can see, should professional rugby become more-compressed in the new post-pandemic reality of possible global recession, there may be a call for semi-professional rugby being more-important than the fully-professional game. However, money talks and I think we will still see, perhaps with fewer cubs, some form of full-time-professional rugby.

The departing Dave Rennie

It was interesting to see, in his valedictory message, prior to quitting Glasgow for the Australian Head Coach's job, Dave Rennie suggesting the two Scottish PRO14 clubs should be, through the formation of A teams, seeking admission to the Celtic Cup, a competition currently involving the A teams of the four Irish and four Welsh PRO14 sides.

Ah hae ma doots about The Junta taking up Rennie's advice, for that matter, why should the Irish and Welsh, already running a short, sharp competition which appears to work, seek to complicate it by involving two Scottish sides? An eight-team competition works neatly: eight quarter-finalists, two semi-finalists and two finalists. Throw in two more sides, getting 12 sides down to two finalists, that's a bit more work.

Also, given the never admitted to reason for going with the six franchises was saving money, given too that belts will need to be tightened in the wake of a pandemic, and given that, with less money coming in, the SRU will need to make cost cuts across the board, would The Junta be so bold as to embark on another professional/performance competition?

Probably, but, will the will to do this still be around given there will be some new faces among the elected officials inside BT Murrayfield?

Given the route map we have seen, or heard about, for emerging from the lockdown, I cannot see any rugby before August at the earliest – even assuming the powers that be can agree revised Laws to cope with any restrictions on movement and inter-personal contact by then.

Then, you look at the unfinished business to be cleared-up: the unplayed Six Nations games; finishing-off the 2019-20 Heineken Cup and PRO14 competitions. Given their importance in terms of commercial income, the Unions will surely want to get as many internationals as possible played as quickly ads possible.

Will the restrictions on crowds be lifted in time? So many questions, so few real answers. I don't see Scottish involvement in the Celtic Cup, assuming it continues, before season 2021-22 at the earliest.

South Korea, hitherto the model for how to handle this pandemic, has within the last two days, been forced to re-impose some restrictions. If the regime which set the template for how to handle things has been forced to crack down again – what chance for the likes of sport in the chaos of the UK, should we have a second spike?

I RECENTLY marked the passing of George Russell, Scottish Rugby's longest-serving rugby club president – having held that position with Moray House RFC for 50-years.

George was better-known across Scotland for his championing of the restoration of the SRU Museum at BT Murrayfield. Every AGM, without fail, George would raise the matter of the missing museum and, every AGM without fail, The Junta

would come up with an ever-more-spurious excuse as to why it wasn't happening.

George's death will not let them off the hook, I can tell those members of The Junta, and there are one or two, who avidly read Aristotle, some of George's friends are determined to honour his memory by taking up the cudgels on his behalf.

I had the honour of writing George's obituary for a national newspaper, and, since its publication, I have received several messages of thanks from guys who knew George, and who supported his fight for the museum

These good, solid rugby clubmen, to a man, also mentioned the abject failure of the SRU to mark George's passing on their website. I know for a fact, the news of his passing was intimated to The Junta, indeed, I am told our highly-paid Head of External Affairs had promised to ensure a tribute was published.

Sadly, Graham Law, just about the only guy in the place with a respect for the history of the game and the guys such as George who are part of that history, is currently furloughed.

In any case, what can you expect from the aforesaid Head of External Affairs - a guy who was so bad at the day job, in his chosen field, he was replaced by Wee Wullie Rennie. I despair.

George Russell deserved better from the SRU.